


The Spy & The Assassin

by iluvaqt



Category: Captain America (Movies), Smallville
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, Bucky Barnes Is Captain America, Drug Use, F/M, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Past Torture, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Role Reversal, Steve Rogers is the Winter Soldier
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-26
Updated: 2016-05-23
Packaged: 2018-05-16 09:37:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 7
Words: 10,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5823592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iluvaqt/pseuds/iluvaqt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>James ‘Bucky’ Barnes is a sickly, weak only child, who is regularly bullied by neighborhood thugs. One day, fate leads Steven Rogers to investigate a ruckus in a dark alleyway. The fighting spirit James displays despite his beating, inspires Steve to befriend him and he teaches Bucky to box so he can better defend himself. Months later after James loses his mother to tuberculosis, the only family he has left in the world, Steve reminds him that he’ll never be alone. They’re friends… “…till the end of the line.” This is a story of friendship, love and loss.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Childhood dreams

Multiple failed attempts at trying to pass the physical to enlist so he can join his best friend fighting on the front lines in Europe. James jumps at the opportunity to serve his country by joining many hopeful recruits enlisted in the S.S.R’s Super Soldier Program. He undergoes the procedure but due to Dr. Erskine’s assassination, he’s too valuable an asset to put into the field. He defies orders when he hears that Steve’s Division, the 107th have been captured by Hydra. 

He succeeds in not only rescuing them, but rallies the prisoners into destroying a Hydra weapons manufacturing plant and confronts the Red Skull.

The S.S.R allow him to form his own team. The Howling Commandos, the 147th Division. 

Steve won’t follow the taller, iconic, enhanced super soldier, the U.S. have dubbed Captain America.

He will however follow the guy he knew from Brooklyn. The skinny guy with a warrior’s spirit, impeccable manners and once had more physical maladies than any one person should have to live with.

He’d fight alongside his best friend. To the end of the line…

In attempting to apprehend Hydra’s lead scientist, Arim Zola, Bucky lost his best friend. Steve was thrown outside the speed train by a ricochet blast from a pulse weapon. When his rail broke, he fell to his death into a icy crevasse. Paralyzed with fear for a split second, when his own grip slipped, Bucky could only watch in horror as he watched Steve’s body slip out of sight as the train turned the bend and he only had seconds to pull himself back inside before the train entered the mountain tunnel. His heart threatening to explode in his chest with the loss of his friend, he focus on completing the mission. Gabe couldn’t finish this on his own. There were still more Hydra agents between the car he was in and the control room where Zola was hiding.

He would push on. For Steve. And he would make Hydra pay. He would not stop until the Red Skull and all of Hydra was in S.S.R custody or dead.

Zola gave up the location of the Red Skull’s consolidated base of operations. They were only just in time catch the bomber plane as it took off headed across the sea to make targeted drops on several of the Allied countries and America’s thriving hub and his and Bucky’s home city, New York.

Bucky fought his nemesis and watched the Red Skull vaporized by his most treasured weapon. The plan had always been to destroy their weapons and capture their operatives. When it was obvious he couldn’t turn the plane around, he aimed for the water. As the surface came up fast in the viewing window, his last thought was that at least he wouldn’t have to tell Rebecca, that Steve wasn’t coming home. That he’d failed to keep him safe. It was a coward’s way out, but he told himself that he was saving thousands of lives. And he hoped that this would honor his friend’s memory. He was finishing the mission. For Steve.

Steering that plane to the ice, he thought was done. That it was the end of the line. Instead, he would wake up 70 years on.  
Steve was long dead and gone. Peggy was an old woman, had lived a full life, helped found a specialized security division, gotten married and had children, grandchildren even. He was a man out of time. Lost in a foreign world. He thought he would remain a relic of war, a hero from an age barely remembered. Until he found a new mission.


	2. The Battle For New York

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fury recruits Bucky for a mission, to recover the stolen Tesseract. He also assigns him a partner, SHIELD Agent Chloe Sullivan.

[](http://ellienovak.tumblr.com/post/135517326065/i-dont-feel-well)   
Photo manipulation by ellienovak.  
. 

When Fury gave him the briefing packet on the Avengers Initiative and the stolen Tesseract power source, he knew he was in for a headache. He would have been better off staying home. Then again, Nicolas Fury was Director of S.H.I.E.L.D - the house of spies and intelligence gathering specialists. He’d probably be able to track him down anywhere.

Out of all the individuals in the packet, the one he was most wary of was Chloe Sullivan. She was only 25 (technically, not that much younger than him if you were counting waking years but seeing it on paper and in print, she looked very young), but her resume read like something out of a novel that would give even the hardest of hearted individuals chills. Torn out of her hometown in her teens and forced to work for a black book project that experimented on powered individuals, she’d been manipulated into a life of espionage and killing. Quickly popping up on S.H.I.E.L.D’s radar, Fury had sent Phil Coulson after her. His job was either stop her or kill her. Coulson had managed to get her to stop long enough to hear him out. The individuals in charge had her mother. They were using her as leverage. They had been for the past four years of her life, that she had been under their thumb. Special Agent Coulson had rescued Chloe’s mother and put her in an ultra secure special care facility with round the clock care to try and cure her mental illness that had progressively worsened under LuthorCorp’s illegal experimentation.

Following that, Chloe joined S.H.I.E.L.D and was one of their best agents although not many people wanted to work with her. Seems she had problems following orders. Completing her objectives were all that mattered to her and how she did that, the costs… well her methods didn’t sit well with him.

When the sky opened up and alien ships started flying through Manhattan, his reasons for not trusting her really didn’t matter. She stayed when every other person around seemed to adhere to the stance of every man for himself. She was efficient, brave and had a can do attitude. And when it came down to the crunch, she could follow orders. Well his orders at least.

After the Battle for New York, he put his doubts aside and decided to give working for S.H.I.E.L.D a chance.

It was good to feel useful again.


	3. The Winter Soldier

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky thought he's seen it all. After waking up after 70 years on ice, riding on a flying aircraft carrier that could turn invisible and fighting off an alien invasion, he thought nothing would ever surprise him anymore. Turns out he was wrong.

Fury was dead. Hill was unreachable, and Chloe had taken the drive Fury had asked him to keep safe. Considering she’d gone off mission, risked her own safety and his getting that damn flash drive off that S.H.I.E.L.D ship in the first place, he was pissed off. Whatever was on it, someone knew Fury was suspicious and had asked Chloe to download that information. That meant that someone or more than a few people at S.H.I.E.L.D had things to hide.

Now they were all on the run from S.H.I.E.L.D and because their ex-STRIKE team mates couldn’t put them down, they’d called in reinforcements.

He thought he’d recognized the eyes of the assassin that had shot up his apartment and taken out Fury. He didn’t want to accept it. Steve had died in the war. To not believe that meant that all this time he’d been a captive of the Soviets, or someone worse and they’d turned his best friend into someone with dead eyes. Those once kind, warm, sincere eyes were cold and devoid of any trace of the man he once knew.

Fighting off blow after from Steve, without his mask and in the light of day there was no disputing it. Steve had survived the fall and Hydra had turned him into their weapon.

He was fast, he was strong. That metal arm of his could punch through metal and tear up asphalt. His mission was to kill them and he was relentless and single-minded in his attack.

Chloe did the damnedest thing. She was always making these wild decisions and leaving him standing there looking like a bull in a china shop. She got two fingers into a spot in his shoulder and twisted. All of a sudden, Steve couldn’t use his metal arm. She then put both hands on his skull. And to Bucky it looked like she was going to snap Steve’s neck. He reached out to her, horror etched on his face. “Chloe, no!”

Steve’s face went slack and his eyes closed. Before he fell to his knees and pitched forward. Chloe caught him around the shoulders before he could face plant.

Bucky noticed the snipers but couldn’t shield her in time. The bullet tore through her back and exited her chest.

He dove at her and dragged her behind a car for cover but soon they were surrounded by STRIKE. Bucky surrendered while Sam held Chloe who was bleeding heavily. 

Maria rescued them from the STRIKE transport and took them to an underground bunker where it turns out Fury wasn’t dead.

Chloe was lucky. The bullet had gone clean through and because she’d lost so much blood, she really didn’t have a choice when she revealed just why she worked best on her own. Fury and Maria already knew, but he and Sam got to witness her healing light show first hand.

“On the bridge, what did you do?” he asked when she regained consciousness. 

“He was rage and pain. That’s all he could feel. You weren’t going to get through to him with all that in his head. I took it away. It’s what I do. I feel things and I can heal, manipulate or amplify. But I need to touch the person. I am a product of both my parents,” she said with a twisted smile and mirthless laugh. “My mother’s gift was to control free will. My biological father is apparently cursed with immortality. He’s been shot, maimed, impaled, and he’s been diagnosed with a terminal illness yet the bastard’s still running around, being a serial menace and general pain in the ass.”

Sam snorted, “Now I get why you have such a winning personality. No offense but your snark-o-meter is a touch on the extreme.”

Chloe smirked at him. “None taken. When people threaten the ones you love, kill them when you don’t cooperate and want to cut you open to see what makes you tick, kinda sucks the joy out of everything. A little hard to be a ray of sunshine, people expect you to be.”

Bucky folded his arms over his chest. “Would you have killed him?”

Chloe gave him a level look. “If it was you or him? Are you sure you don’t already know the answer?”

“That wasn’t what I asked,” Bucky said, a muscle in his cheek twitching. A sure sign he was about to get snippy with her. He was so easy to read and rule up. Sometimes she would do it just for kicks. She was easily bored. Ever since Fury paired them she felt like she’d been assigned babysitting duty and worse, that she as being punished for something. As if she hadn’t done everything she’d ever been asked to do from day one. But Barnes grew on you. Like this pesky thing called a conscience. It lingered, pointing out all your mistakes and flaws, but after awhile you realized you needed it. That you were slipping into old habits, bad habits and he grounded you, pulled you back. Made you want to be better.

“I know what it’s like to feel trapped. To have no choice. To get so deep, that you will do what you have to, to survive. He’s trapped, Barnes. I couldn’t get a full read on him. But I do know that in that rage, there was something. The longer he fought you… There was conflict. And from what I know of Winter’s reputation, he’s only hesitated once before.”

 

“You mean when he tired to kill Luthor? When he shot you?”

"I walked into the first shot. But the second one went through Lex’s chest. It was a kill shot. He was dead before he hit the floor.”

Sam looked shocked but Maria and Nick didn’t. He had a feeling they knew this story.

“You saved him,” Bucky said. It wasn’t a question. He’d seen what her body had healed while she was unconscious.

Chloe nodded. “He has an Amazonian bodyguard. She ordered me to bring him back or she’d kill my cousin. They’d already taken out my father when I tried to escape with my mother a couple years before. So I healed him, and woke up in my fully bugged apartment. Your Steve was standing over me with a glock pointed at my head. I asked him why he hadn’t pulled the trigger. He didn’t answer me but I could feel that same thing… conflict. Whatever the reason, he couldn’t. He told me that they were onto me. That Luthor was not his mission any longer but I was on their list. He said that if Lex valued me as an asset he should reassign me, immediately. Then he disappeared. That was four years ago.”

::: ::: :::

Fury explained the plan to disable the Hellicarriers before the could come online. Chloe and Maria would infiltrate the Traskelion and try to scrub the launches. And he and Sam would replace the targeting systems on board the control decks if they failed.

Knowing that Steve’s mission wasn’t over, that he would be back, Bucky went to get his old uniform. If he was going to face Steve again he wanted to try to trigger a memory, anything to push that conflicting signal into something deeper, so he could pull his friend back from whatever pit Hydra had forced him into.

It had worked. Refusing to fight him, showing his face and releasing his shield, before he could crush his skull with a finishing blow using his metal fist, he’d seen recognition in Steve’s eyes. 

A week later he was in pain all over but he was still alive and the hope that Steve could be saved. He just had to find him.

::: ::: :::

Chloe had fished his shield out of the river and put it in his hospital room. After he’d woken up she’d offered to heal him but he refused. He said he wasn’t the type to ever put his burdens on anyone else. But he appreciated the gesture. 

Then she’d gifted him with a file. Lex never let anyone that crossed his path go without digging up everything he could find on them. It was Steve’s file. The Soviets had kept him prisoner and then years later they had handed him over to Zola to complete his experiments. Steve now had a similar super serum in his blood. Over the years they had thawed him out, sent him out on assassinations and then put him back on ice. 

When she had dumped all of S.H.I.E.L.D’s secrets online, Chloe had exposed herself, all her secrets and her past. The people she had been hiding from now knew where to find her. 

He wanted her to stay but he couldn’t ask her to.   
  
“Barnes, be careful. Freedom isn't the same thing as living free.”


	4. Smithsonian

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Holding his life between her palms, she felt connected to him in a way that she had never felt before. And after learning that he pulled Bucky from the Potomac, she knew that this time he wasn't going back. And if he was going to run, he'd need help.

Chloe knew where to look. After all, she’d done exactly the same thing after Phil had freed her and her mother from under Lex’s machinations. The first place she’d gone was to check on Lois. The only family she had left that she cared about. The only family she had left that she cared about. The only one who’d never stopped looking for her, who’d never stopped believing she was still alive, even after Lex had convinced everyone she was dead. 

Forced into seeing what he’d become, and saving his former best friend after shooting him up and nearly beating him to death, Chloe knew what he’d be searching for. Something to reinforce those memories, those human connection instincts that Bucky had reawakened.

He had run from Bucky, but only because he couldn’t face what he’d done, how far he’d fallen. Not after seeing Bucky’s belief and trust in him. He wouldn’t feel worthy of that. Not after all that he’d done, not just to Barnes himself but all the lives he’d taken, families he’d destroyed, countries he’d destabilized.

“I’m digging the hair,” she said quietly, silently coming up to his human shoulder. “Do you know who I am?”

 

He glanced at her out of his peripheral. His posture tightened and she could see his fists clenched but he didn’t flee. “Are you here to bring me in?”

“That depends,” she said, putting her hands folded in front of her in a show of good faith. “Are you going to fall into old habits or are you starting a new chapter?”

“I can’t… I won’t do that anymore. But I don’t know where to go from here. Everything’s different. The world’s changed.”

Chloe twitched a smirk. “New tech, fancier clothes, same politics and power games. You don’t have to do it alone.”

Steve looked at her properly then. Chloe could see how hopeful, yet still suspicious his gaze was behind his glasses. “Why would you help me?”

“You were sent to kill me, you didn’t,” she said simply. “I know what it’s like to start over after not being in control, not having choices, feeling trapped and forced to betray everything that made you decent person.”

“The first few days of being awake, the pain is excruciating but to Hydra pain is a tool. There is no order without pain. And with no order there is only chaos.”

“Sounds like propaganda and bullshit to me,” she said folding her arms. “I could feel the pain, but it’s not so bad now. Your back and neck, does it hurt all the time?”

Steve nodded. “Some days worse than others, but never more than when I first wake up. But pain doesn’t excuse any of what I did.”

Chloe let out a long breath. “Nothing ever excuses murder. It’s a line we can’t come back from. We’ll pay for our actions the rest of our lives, but the difference is where we go from here.”

“I remember him,” he said with a tilt of his head at Bucky’s smiling face. “He won’t stop looking, he was damn stubborn like that. Persistent, pit-bull with a pant-leg jerk.”

 

Chloe grinned. “Reminds me of someone else I know. Barnes might look but I can hide you until you’re ready to be found. Years of experience and a unique skill set taught me how to be invisible.”

“You were Luthor’s spy.”

“Not a willing one. But we can swap stories later. I play the ditsy blonde for unsuspecting marks but I’m not an idiot. Someone else will make the educated guess about where you might go and we should be long gone before they do.”

“Bucky trusts you. I saw it in the way he let you have his back. He won’t understand if you keep this from him,” he said quietly. 

Chloe shrugged one shoulder. “He’ll want to coddle you and expect you to reminisce like old times. He won’t understand that you’ll never be that guy again. He’s dead.”

Steve snorted. “I have a feeling you’d have a horrible bedside manner.”

“I’m a realist. You need a new mission. If you don’t find a way to define yourself, you’ll fall into rut you won’t ever find a way out of.”

“So where to from here?”

“Wakanda,” she said. 

“Africa?” he asked her skeptically.

“No extradition. Also it’s a good staging point to start looking for answers. According to the files I skimmed before exposing S.H.I.E.L.D’s intelligence database, there are several Hydra locations off the coast, one in Cairo and two in the Balkans.”

“Sounds like a plan. There are a few stops I want to make on the way. There’s things I left in the field - traps, weapons… Bodies. Their families deserve closure.”

“You go down that road, a lot of people won’t let it end there.”

Steve hung his head and buried his gloved hands in his jacket pockets. “Every crime carries a punishment.”

“Remind me to introduce you to my mother. You weren’t in control, Rogers. Who knows how many puppet masters were pulling the strings. Don’t let the guilt consume you. You’re finally your own man. You can make a difference but you won’t be much good dead or in a prison cell. If you think you can trust me, meet me at the Volstak Shipyard in Newark in two days. I’ll have our IDs and transport arranged by then. In the meantime, stay off the streets.”

It was on the tip of his tongue to say he would need to do a little B & E because he had nothing to his name but she pressed a envelope against his chest. He only just managed to free one hand to catch it before it slid down his front. Inside was three hundred dollars and a key with an address on a card. 

_Safehouse. Lock up when you leave._

He looked up to find she was gone. He stood and cast his eye over the grand exhibit. It paid tribute to heroes and best friends that had changed the tide of war together. In his mind’s eye he saw another fight, one that took place in the streets of D.C. Once friends, turned enemies. It gave him chills to remember how determined he’d been to kill Bucky. 

She was right, he would never be that smiling, young hero ever again. But he didn’t have to be a soulless assassin either. He stuffed her envelope into his pocket. 

She was a mysterious dame. And there was more than a hint of danger to her aura. The first time he’d seen her through his sniper’s scope years go, his finger had paused on the trigger. There was something about her eyes that made his chest ache. He couldn’t kill her. She wasn’t even looking his way but he had seen the reflection of her face in the mirror in Luthor’s office. She hated the man, but she still moved to put herself between him and the window at his back. Steve still didn’t know if she’d spotted him or not but once she was out of the way, he made his kill shot.

Lionel Luthor was a Hydra sympathizer and financier. In exchange for money, he had acquired connections and influence. When Luthor senior died of a terminal illness, his son inherited his empire but didn’t care for his father’s connections. Luthor Jr. cut ties with Hydra and that didn’t make his handler’s happy. Lex Luthor earned a death mark and they’d sourced an illegitimate heir and groomed her to step in once they’d taken Lex off the board. They’d changed their mind when they realized just how much damaging Intel., Luthor acquired and the powered individuals he’d surrounded himself with. But they wanted his lifeline Meta out of the equation. It was the first time and only instance that he could remember that he’d not completed his mission. They’d punished him badly for it, and by the time they’d wiped him and sent him out again, she’d done the smart thing and disappeared deeper into Luthor’s network. 

Now, like him, she was free. While she’d spoken to him, she’d let a little of the carefully crafted, cool and flippant facade fall and he’s seen the damaged but resilient character battling to soldier on underneath. 

They were scarred, broken and tainted by evil but they weren’t done. She had chosen to continue her fight, this time to protect instead of destroying lives. Maybe together, they could find a way to shed the ghosts that dogged their steps, and find some peace for themselves in an imperfect world.


	5. At Sea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning: mentions of non-con/rape

::: ::: :::  
They spent their time in the cargo hold. At night they could go up on deck for a few hours, while just the first mate and a few crew kept a look out for hijackers.

At first Steve was fine. But the longer they were at sea, the paler he got. When they hit a storm, and it was all hands monitoring pump stations, he couldn’t stand without stumbling. By the time they hit the eye and calmer waters which was about five miles wide, Steve was green and couldn’t keep anything down.

She had paid the captain a hefty fee in cash to let them travel on board, no questions asked. But Steve was so violently sick he was getting nervous. The ship's first mate was worried that their shady hitchhiker was contagious and had expressed his opinion vocally, he didn’t want any of his crew catching anything. Chloe assured the captain that it was just bad motion sickness but to be on the safe side she’d agreed to keep him in strict quarantine. Hence why they didn’t mingle with anyone and waited till dark to walk around for fresh air.

Steve was bathed in a cold sweat but at least he’s stopped vomiting. She didn’t understand it. She could feel how acute his discomfort was but she’d never felt any motion sickness like his before.  
It was only when he started thrashing and moaning, his muscles all over his body cramping that she realized that Hydra had employed more than one method of control to keep him manageable and dependant.

He was coming off whatever cocktail they had cooked up for his system and now he was crashing hard. The swaying and rolling of the boat probably didn’t help matters either.

Wiping his face and neck down again, she spoon feed him the broth she’d had the cook make for him. His stomach was constantly cramping that he could only handle about a spoonful every half hour.

If his body wasn’t enhanced with rapid cell regeneration, she was sure he’d be wasting away by now. But even with his body working to fix the damage and imbalance caused by the withdrawal, he was still ghastly pale, trembling and as weak as a newborn kitten.

“Chloe?” he mumbled, half delirious.

“I’m here,” she said softly.

“You won’t leave?” he asked, his voice uncertain and vulnerable.

“I won’t,” she promised.

Steve closed his eyes then, but he gripped her hand in his and he had a surprisingly strong grip for someone who hadn’t eaten properly in days.  
The storm passed over them and after about eight hours of travelling over flat sea, Steve started to improve. By day six after his symptoms first presented, he could sit up and feed himself.  
He was embarrassed and he wouldn’t meet her eyes when she sat with him, but he never asked her to leave. She brought him meals and bundled him up in a thick fisherman’s coat to walk up on deck.

Four weeks at sea and land was at long last within sight. They were to stay below deck, until customs came on board and checked the crew papers. The captain had logged their aliases (he didn’t know they were aliases but probably suspected) and so long as their passports matched their papers, there wouldn’t be any problems.

They’d played a lot of various card games and charades to pass the time. Neither of them were big on talking unless it was really late and their mental defences were wearing down from fatigue.  
She learned that Steve was extremely quick witted and his gift for snark probably outstripped her own. He’d surprised her, shocked her really a few times when his candor would catch her off guard.

“You know Luthor probably had hair envy.”

“What?”

He rolled into his side and, scratched his regrowth on his head. His closely shorn haircut was growing out, and it was obviously tickling. “His security detail. The men were all balding or clean shaven.”

Chloe snorted and then laughed outright. “You know I never noticed that.” She closed her eyes and groaned. “I never caught that,” she muttered as she face palmed. “Some crack spy I am.”  
“I’m sure you had other things to worry about. Like watching your back.”

Chloe narrowed her eyes at him. “Because Lex didn’t trust me? Because I’m a Meta? A mutant?”

“Because you’re a beautiful woman.”

That shut her up and killed her tirade in a heartbeat. She swallowed and sucked in an unsteady breath. “Mercy trained me. She’s the Amazonian I told you about. I knew how to break an opponent’s bones in three moves and incapacitate them before Lex ever put me out in the field. He didn’t want his asset stolen or compromised before I’d proved my worth. He’d sunk a lot of money, dissecting my abilities in his lab. None of his guys would dare try their luck on anyone in a Luthor’s employ. He might be a sadistic narcissist but he’s a professional and he expects his employees to adhere to a strict standard too. The bastard has an ethical code,” she said with a scoff.

Steve lay on his back and put one arm behind his head, while he stared at the ceiling. “I’m glad you weren’t mistreated in that way,” he said his voice low, deeper.

Chloe stopped breathing, understanding what he hadn’t said. “There are things I had to do to sell a cover, but I was never… Abused,” she told him.

He wouldn’t tell her anything more until three weeks into the trip, after he had woken up from a nightmare. His loud protests and desperate pleading woke her, and afraid to touch him, because he was thrashing and shaking, she had thrown a wet cloth at his chest to jar him awake. Wide-eyed and soaked with sweat, he had looked down and noticed he’d torn his blanket to shreds. Burying his face in his hands, she had approached him carefully and asked it was okay to hug him.  
He had consented with a wordless nod and no sooner had her arms come sound his shoulders, he started talking.

It had happened repeatedly while he was a Soviet captive. Before Hydra. A high ranking female officer in the prison camp had taken an interest in him. At first she’d just ordered him to clean her office and the Officers’ Mess. Then she’d ordered him to take showers while she watched. He knew what was coming and tried to be as uncooperative as possible. It hadn't made a difference. He was a prisoner, a wounded, one armed prisoner at that. And she had something to combat his disinterest. Every other night for three months she took him out of his cell block and returned him before morning. She did things, horrific things. He didn’t feel human after he left her. He was just a shell to be used and tossed aside. It only stopped because she was reassigned.

Chloe didn’t say anything to interrupt him as the words spilled out of this physically strong, and visually intimidating man. Inside he was broken and fragile, that at any moment, he could shatter completely and there would be no putting him back together. She drew him against her, letting her softness mould against all his hard muscle and cold metal. He held onto her so tightly that his fingers pressed deep into her skin. It hurt but she didn’t make a sound. She stroked his short hair and kissed his forehead like a mother would comforting her child.

The longer they held each other, his shaking became more subdue and his breathing eased till it was calm and regular. His hold didn’t release like she anticipated it should, so awkwardly she shuffled into his camp bed beside him. It was cramped but it beat trying to sleep with him on her shoulder while she continued to kneel on the floor.

Hours later, she stirred to the feeling of wondering hands. They rubbed through the layers of her pants and a need she hadn’t serviced in a while surged to attention. Her first instinct while coming to slow awareness that she was safe and his touch not unwanted, was to rock with the motion. Having turned over in her sleep, they fit together like spoons in a drawer and a growing hardness against the curve of her bottom made heat quake over her body. Realizing where she was and who she was with, she froze. His was a normal response for anyone who woke up next to a body they found desirable.

The last thing Steve needed from her, after the confession and trauma he’d relived was to cloud his only new and supportive relationship with lust. He trusted her. And what he needed, what he really needed, was someone who could help build him stronger, not a distraction. She put her hand over his questing ones and stilled them, drawing them up to a much safer zone over her stomach.  
Interlacing her fingers with his other hand, his metal one, she lifted it from her hip and pressed their joined hands to her mouth.

She kissed his fingers, feeling the very faint jolt of electricity that flowed beneath the shifting interlocked layers of this bionic limb. The flow that simulated touch awareness and sent those impulses up this arm to his nerve center.

“I’m here for you, Steve. They won’t hurt you or use you anymore, I won’t let them. Sleep,” she urged him gently. “You’re safe.”

He buried his face in her hair. She forced herself to relax against the tickling sensation of his breath over the sensitive skin of her throat. He was still aroused, but his body no longer rocked against hers. When he fell into a deeper sleep, he finally let go.

She slipped from his arms and pulled a chair closer to his bed to sit in. Chloe drew his blanket up so that it was tucked around him, warding off the cold. For the rest of the night she held his hands and he slept peacefully with no nightmares plaguing his dreams.

When daylight came he didn’t say a word about what he’d told her that night, or that he may have woke up wanting physical release. So they moved on with the day, and as usual, she took her cues over what she could do with him, based on his comfort level. Today he was relatively pain free, which meant a work out, maybe even a sparring match wouldn’t be out of the question. She smiled at the prospect.

Steve was disappointed to find her no longer in his arms when he woke. He pushed down the feeling as soon as it arose knowing she would sense it. He closed his eyes feeling not for the first time a little frustrated over her ability. She’d explained in broad terms her gifts and he’d read between the lines. She could feel and manipulate emotion but she wouldn’t. At least not with him. He was grateful for her promise, knowing that he could trust her. That his emotional responses would be his own. At the same time it bothered him that she knew more about what was going on with him, learning him better while she remained a mystery.

He was attracted to her. She was beautiful and she had shown him kindness and acceptance. It was care that he hadn’t been shown for a very long time. What felt like another lifetime. These were concepts and feelings Steve understood, not The Winter Soldier. Yet instead of being fearful of accepting her compassion, worrying over whether it was genuine or fleeting. He embraced it. There was always this lingering doubt and fear though that her presence, her stability and care would be snatched away from him. And that frustrated him, because as much as he wanted to accept that those doubts would take time to conquer, he worried that these emotions that she could sense, where what kept her at a distance. That his doubts made her doubt him.

He opened his eyes and saw her smile bathed by the dawning sun, casting light through the ship portal window. The muscles in his chest tightened and he felt his heart pump faster in his chest.  
In the wake of her smile everything else faded away.

“A new day,” she said, squeezing his fingers. “Are you ready?”

Steve squeezed her hand back, only just noticing that she held his hands. Both of them. He swallowed with difficulty. She wasn’t afraid to touch him. To hold that monstrous part of him. Tears burned in his eyes and he blinked them away. Turning his face to the ceiling, he nodded and carefully detangled their fingers. It was too much to process while still in direct contact.  
He sat up, the cover falling to his waist. He watched her gaze track down his chest to the thick trail of hair that started at his navel and disappeared below his waist still covered by the blanket. He smiled slowly, meeting her eyes and watched them crinkle at the edges when she noted that she’s been caught.

A surge of masculine pride bolstered his confidence and he straightened, sitting a little taller. She wasn’t unaffected by him, and that was a start.


	6. Comoros Islands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve is on every most wanted list around but no one really knows who The Ghost, a.k.a The Winter Soldier really is. Chloe offers to help him figure out who he wants to be, now that he’s escaped Hydra control. She’s got trouble of her own to sort out, when she realizes that exposing all SHIELD’s secrets, she may have put her mother back within Lex’s grasp.

From the docks they took a sea plane to the Comoros Islands. It’s crystal blue water and white sand beaches were unlike anything Steve had ever seen. It was like stepping into a painting from one of the looted galleries he’d passed through in Austria during the war, an imagined paradise he’d never thought he’d ever get to visit. But they weren’t here to holiday. In exposing Hydra within SHIELD, every secret and operation was there for anyone to go digging through to find.

Chloe explained that Agent Coulson, her boss, a man that would later become a trusted friend had hidden her mother, but her location was no longer secure. 

She checked in with the front desk and signed herself and Steve under their aliases. She had only visited once before. When Phil had first moved her in. Her mother was catatonic and wouldn’t know if she was there or not. She wanted to keep her safe. And that meant not allowing her location to be compromised.

The nurse said that Moira Jane was in her room.

She saw the back of her mother’s dark hair, which had been cropped shorter since the last time she’d seen her. Perhaps it was more manageable that way.

“Disappointing, Sullivan. SHIELD? You just traded one oppressive fear mongering machine for another. Tell me, did it help you sleep any better at night?”

Chloe froze as she heard the voice of her first trainer and eventually her nemesis. The woman looked at her coldly, calmly, from where she sat in her mother’s spacious room. Lex might have been pulling the strings but it was Mercy that kept her in line. “If that’s what you believe he’s doing, why stay?”

“He pays me well, and unlike you I don’t care for the chaos that disorder breeds. Lex may be tyrannical, but he’s not a monster.”

Chloe snorted and discreetly put her hand on her thigh holster hidden under her dress, ready to draw if Mercy even twitched funny. “Monsters don’t always look the part on the surface. Anyone who’s been a resident of one of his labs would disagree with you. Where is she?”

“You already know. Ready to come back to the fold?”

“Never.”

Mercy threw a vase at her and dove at her, after vaulting over the lounge chair. Chloe only got three shots off, all of which missed their intended target and one with one blow to her wrist, Mercy kicked the gun out of reach and threw her into a corner table, breaking a lamp and the table in the process. 

Steve, who had been waiting outside, giving her space, heard the commotion and burst into the room.

Pain from her broken wrist bloomed like an inferno, sending lightening burst of pain, clouding her concentration. She rolled out of reach when Mercy brought her pointed heels down where she had fallen after her weight has cracked the table. Chloe dodged her blows and had put her forearm inside her jacket to keep her had from flopping around and making her vision blur from the pain.

She let Mercy run her into the wall and brought her elbow down on the back of her head. A satisfying crack rendering her opponent unconscious. Her vision swimming from having hit her head against the plaster, even denying it, combined with the pain in her wrist was making her movement sluggish.

Steve caught her when she stumbled, her foot catching on Mercy’s arm from where she was crumpled on the floor.

“We have to leave, quickly.” Mercy wouldn’t be out for long. Amazonians were remarkably resilient.

He helped her out a back exit and they quickly re-boarded the plane. The pilot had been refueling and it was fortunate that he’d started straight away, instead of waiting till they were ready to leave.

“Who was that?” Steve asked when they were strapped in and pulling away from the island.

“Mercy. Lex has my mother.”

Steve clenched his jaw and his eyes hardened. “We’ll get her back.”

“No, we won’t,” Chloe said firmly. “You’re a fugitive. Lex can’t know about you. I told you what my mother can do. What Lex will make her do. I’ll find her on my own.”

Steve felt the muscles in his cheek tick and his left eyelid was starting to twitch. A sure sign that not only did he need sleep but that he was frustrated. “I need to do something. Chloe, you said yourself if I don’t find a new mission…”

“Not this one,” she said her voice hard, before darting a glance at their pilot who had his earphones on. “Steve, this isn’t your fight,” she said more softly. "You don’t want to get on Lex’s radar.“

He gave her a dark humorless smile. "Did you forget how we first met?”

Chloe rolled her eyes and folded her hands over her chest. “You really want him to remember that?”

“You never forget your enemies, Chloe. And you’re not that naive to think that he won’t have seen the footage from D.C.”

They had a silent staring content for the next two minutes, and she huffed when she saw his raised eyebrow and the challenging half smirk. “I used to be pretty good at watching my friend’s back and I’ve earned my reputation as The Ghost. I can be invisible.”

“Not next to me you won’t be. Steve, my face was all over every news station after SHIELD collapsed.”

“You’d be surprised at how quickly you can disappear in another country. Not everywhere’s saturated by media and electronics.”

“Just so you know what you’re asking to sign on for, Lex surrounds himself with his own personal army and he’s got access to weapons and tech that Stark hasn’t even dreamed up yet. LexCorp was once Stark Industries direct competition for DOD contracts until Stark stopped making weapons.”

“He doesn’t frighten me. He’s a man. One man.”

Chloe shivered. “One man with a lot of power, resources and is a law unto himself.”

“Why hasn’t SHIELD arrested him.”

“He’s cunning and he’s a more intelligent than most people give him credit for. Also, it had to make things stick when witnesses and evidence disappear.”

Her wrist was on fire and still making her see stars. It was probably fractured in multiple places, still she couldn’t let it heal now. She could only regenerate while she was unconscious, and because of the light show, unless she was sheltered, she would always attract attention. No, she’d have to wait a few hours until she could find a room somewhere. 

As luck would have it, they found a room in a boutique-style hotel that was renting for a third of the cost. They were light on tourists in the off season and to attract local bookings they’d slashed their room rates.

It was nice to be surrounded by creature comforts such as fine linen, a pillow top mattress and a bathtub after camp fold outs, scratchy sheets and stale air for so long.

Steve’s stomach growled, and he ducked his face and held his arm across his middle in embarrassment. 

Chloe smirked and touched his arm. Nodding at her duffle bag that held their supplies. “Use some cash and get whatever you want. I’m going to shower and then strap this up.”

He gave her a look of concern. “Do you need help with that? I can make a pretty good splint in a pinch.”

She waved him off. “I’m going to close the shutters and draw all the curtains. It’ll heal up once I sleep. Don’t worry about it, Steve. It’s fine.”

He gave her a dubious look but didn’t argue the point. “Anything you prefer? I haven’t had beef casserole in who knows how long and I’m sort of craving it after walking by the restaurants on the way through.”

“The heat and this stinging is making me light headed. A strong coffee and a muffin will do.”

“I’ll get you a Boost fresh juice or something,” he said firmly. “Coffee will just dehydrate you.”

Chloe stuck out her tongue at him. “Yes, Dad. And how do you know about Boost Juice Bars?”

Steve snorted. “I didn’t wake up yesterday, you know.”

Chloe smirked and shrugged her jacket off, hissing when it pulled on her wrist. “Damn it, should have unzipped the sleeves.”

“I can stay until…”

“Unless you’re going to scrub my back and wash my hair, get,” she said pushing against his chest, urging him to the door. She also dropped his football cap and sunglasses into his hand. 

Reluctantly, he opened the door and left. At the mention of joining her, Steve felt his mouth go dry and all of a sudden he wasn’t very hungry anymore. But she was determined to get rid of him, so he went. His head unable to shake the image of what she might look like with soap suds cascading down her pale skin, while his hands worked a lather into those corn silk, golden strands that looked feather soft. 

With a groan, he sagged back against the hotel door and closed his eyes. He wanted her. Pretty badly by this point but he had no idea how to go about showing that.

Not only was he years out of practice on the art of social skills and courting, never having a thought for himself beyond not failing his missions so he wouldn’t be punished. But he’d never worried about being short of female company in his past, before the war. He’d always been able to charm himself a date. Or even two, so Bucky would have company too. 

Chloe made him feel unsure of himself. She unsettled him. A little like the first time he’d met Margret ‘Peggy’ Carter, their SSR liaison. It was the first time a woman hadn’t even given him a second glance, it was disconcerting. He’d been so used to the running point in their friendship, trying to draw Bucky out, introduce him to new people, new experiences that having their roles reversed was a shock. Because even while Bucky was Captain America, and their team leader, that dynamic of being friends and partners was still there. 

Steve was still protecting him, cautioning his more bullheaded, reckless buddy who liked to barrel headlong into danger, always thinking of others and the mission, his own safety an after thought. It was his self appointed job to keep Bucky safe. But in that bar in France, Bucky hadn’t needed him. And since then, he’d been a little uncertain of his own desirability. Now scarred both inside and out, he had almost no confidence in his own worthiness and appeal.

For all her kindness, she’s probably looked at him as some kind of charity case. Something to pity.

Shoving his gloved hands into the pockets of his jeans, he pushed away from the door and headed down the hall. Hoping for anything more than friendship with a beautiful, independent and confident woman like Chloe was a fantasy.


	7. Scars of War

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chloe was an Agent of SHIELD. Now she has gone dark to search for her mother and she's committed to help Steve live a life, free from Hydra.

  
**fanart by Purple-Moon123**

**::: ::: :::**

**2 weeks ago**

  
He was pale and sweaty. She mopped his face and neck at least every hour and helped him change his shirt twice. Considering neither of them had packed many sets of clothing, she was having to do laundry every day so that he wouldn’t run out of things to wear. Her eyes wouldn’t complain about the view if it came to that. He had a very aesthetic form but he was already unwell, it would be horrible for him to get a cold on top of that. If he was even capable of getting sick. Bucky’s metabolism and serum infused blood didn’t allow him to get sick. It burned through any invading virus or bacteria before it even had a chance to present symptoms. She suspected whatever Hydra had come up with and used on Steve, had a similar effect or Steve wouldn’t have survived the thaw and freeze process the first time let alone repeatedly over the years.

It was late evening and she was reading a book by penlight when she heard him move. He stopped vomiting but he was still a little listless and got dizzy easily, so she was hesitant to leave him alone for any extended period of time. She was working on helping him getting his strength back by loading him up on what broth and bread he could stomach. Tomorrow, she’d start walking him around the deck again.

She watched as he sat up and drew one knee up onto the mattress, looking so forlorn and miserable, that she closed her book and went over to him. Chloe waited until his eyes flicked over her before she dared to touch him. She found out fairly quickly after sparing space with him on a regular basis that Steve was a sleepwalker. If she didn’t close the hatch before she went to sleep, he would wander around the ship and get lost. He’d scared the ship’s nurse half to death before she found him once. He had the woman cornered under a set of stairs. He made no move to grab her or anything but she was staring between Steve’s metal arm and his scruffy face and she looked terrified.

Chloe had coaxed him away gently and he had been pliant when she lead him away, back to the cargo hold. At this moment, he continued to sit, unmoving but obviously unhappy, she put her hand on his jaw and traced up the side of his face to his closely cropped hair, which was soft if you brushed it back but coarse if you rubbed it the other way, like tiger’s fur. As she played with his hair in a soothing motion, he ducked his face forward against her stomach.

She held him there and bit her lip against the sudden surge of desire when his hands came up on her hips drawing her between his muscled thighs. The contrast of his fingers, warm and cold against her skin where her shirt had ridden up a little did wicked things to her nerve endings. Her brain supplied images and speculation of what it would feel like to have that contrasting touch stimulate other areas of her body simultaneously. She let out a breathy groan and squeezed her legs more tightly together to quell the growing need coiling inside her.

Steve pushed the fabric of her shirt up and started planting warm kisses against her stomach. His beard scratching her sensitive skin lightly with every movement.

Chloe held his head more purposefully, her soothing motions stopping all together with the distraction of his mouth. She threw her head back and only just managed to clamp down on her lips before a loud gasp could escape her throat when his hot tongue swiped across her belly.

Steve leaned back on the bed and because he tugged her with him, Chloe ended up indelicately straddling his crotch.

She could feel how aroused he was and even in the low light, when she propped herself up on her hands to look at him, she could see the dark gleam of primitive desire in his eyes.

His hands moved up the middle of her back and drew her down. He leaned up and kissed her throat and her pulse point, while Chloe clamped her eyes shut, wondering how badly she’d be condemned for letting things get out of hand. Steve was not himself, he was vulnerable and he trusted her to look out for him. She could take advantage of his fragile emotional state. Holding his face, she urged him to rest back against the pillow. “Steve, this kind of exertion really isn’t the best thing for you right now.”

The intense look in his eyes softened to a point that made Chloe’s heart ache. She wanted to grab him, hold him close and never let go. Lois had always accused her of being a total sucker for strays. Whenever she’d stayed with her cousins growing up, she would find all the strays or abandoned animals.

At Fort Barnaby, she had found a litter of kittens under an old tyre heap in the middle of summer. A soft meowing had caught her attention. She had dragged Lois along and they’d told one of the drill sergeants but no one had wanted to touch them because they hissed and spit at anyone who tried to get close. Chloe had persisted. She got a large open box and put on rigger’s gloves and just scooped them up, while they hissed, scratched and bit all the while. They had been dehydrated and hungry. She kept them in the back of the gym and looked after then until the local shelter staff could come down and collect them. By the time the vet came around, Chloe had wanted to keep them all. Even the eldest, and self appointed protector of the litter, which was still trying to scratch or bite her every time she put her hand in the open box. But she wasn’t allowed to keep any. She and her dad lived in a small apartment building in Metropolis and the was a no pets policy. As the kittens were taken away, even at 7-years-old she had worried over their fate.

Steve was no stray, Bucky was looking for him and she was fairly sure his sister was still alive. Yet, he was in need of nurturing and he was a lost soul. Lois would be laughing her ass off at her right now. She’d gone and rescued another person when she was really in no position to help anyone but herself.

  
Steve didn’t look happy about her caution, giving her a wounded puppy expression and an exaggerated pout but he didn’t press her either. He let out a loud exhale and pulled her close, hugging her to his chest.

  
Chloe put her head down and let herself be held. With his arms wrapped around her, she wondered who was comforting whom. His heart beat was a strong calming thump and as she listened, she realized his breathing was even and soft. Tilting her chin up, she looked at his face, his eyes were closed and his mouth was relaxed. He was asleep.

  
With a Herculean effort, she dragged herself up and returned to her own narrow cot. Her book forgotten by her thoughts preoccupied of a bearded, handsome man sleeping peacefully a short distance away, it was a long time before she finally fell asleep.

  
The next morning she found him awake before her doing one armed push ups on the floor. With his human arm. “You’re feeling better I assume?”  
He grunted in response and kept up his rapid rhythm until he stopped after another five minutes. He sat on the floor with his back to her and she could see all the muscles rippling and twitching from his workout.  
A fine sheen of sweat caught the light from the portal window and she was glad he wasn’t watching. She was pretty sure he might catch her drooling. She closed her eyes and let out a slow breath. She really was her own worst enemy. She was determined not to let things get physical or emotional between them and she was already failing miserably at the latter. At this rate, it would only be a matter of time before caved and she jumped him.

  
“Did I do something strange again last night?” he asked quietly.

Chloe swallowed her tongue and sat up, trying to think of what he might remember and what she should say. She smoothed down her shirt and crossed her legs where she sat on the mattress, not all that dissimilar to the position she’d seen him in last night.

  
Steve turned then and looked back at her over his shoulder, catching the frown marring her brows. “You’re usually up before me.”

Chloe shrugged one shoulder. “Lack of sleep has finally caught up with me.”

“Sorry,” he said, glancing away again but not before she caught the look of self depreciation that came over his face.

  
She got to her feet and put a hand on his shoulder. He was warm, but not sickly so. He really was coming back to normal. Which was an enormous relief. She wasn’t used to looking after anyone and she was feeling off balance by the protective, nurturing instincts he invoked in her. There was a big difference between patching up wounded in the field until they could get proper medical attention, and tending to a sick friend who had no more strength than a small child. “Hey, did you hear me complaining? You didn’t choose what they did to you. So don’t beat yourself up about it. I’m glad you’re feeling better.”

“Did I sleepwalk again?” he asked, his clear blue eyes, probing and serious. “I didn’t try raiding the kitchen this time, did I? What did I do?”

The reason why he’d run into the nurse last time was he’d been muttering about needing medical supplies, because Bucky had a broken nose and a split eyebrow from winding up on the bitter end of yet another back alley skirmish. Chloe had gotten him back in bed by promising to take care of Bucky herself. That he’d be good as new. She sighed inwardly, realizing that last night, he’d probably been dreaming again. In his fog, she wondered who he’d been dreaming about. He was a little too handsy and it felt too intimate for it to be a family member, and she distinctly remembered just how responsive he was to her body. She felt heat creeping up her neck, and breathed slow and deep to keep it from climbing any higher. She picked at lint on her PJ bottoms.  
“I keep the hatch closed, and it’s too complicated for you to figure out while you’re asleep. You didn’t say anything and you went right back to sleep. No terrified nurses this time,” she said brightly.

Steve noticed the way she wouldn’t keep his gaze for longer than necessary and she hadn’t really answered the question. He got the impression that she was hiding something but he wouldn’t push. After all she’d done for him, the last thing he wanted was for her to feel like he was ungrateful or to regret helping him by being invasive or difficult.

  
“Speaking of kitchens, you’re probably hungry,” she suggested.  
Steve got to his feet and pulled a sweater over his head. “Starving,” he replied. He pushed his hands into the pockets of his denims. “Wanna come with?”  
Chloe smiled at him warmly. “Sure. Just let me change. Turn around.”

“Are you sure?” he teased.

  
Chloe felt her lips twitch and she narrowed her eyes at him playfully. “Yes, I’m sure.”

  
She got changed quickly and just to test that he wasn’t peeking out of the corner of his eye, her feet still bare, she crept up on him and tickled his ribs. He grabbed her wrists and wrestled her to his front, chuckling. “Who’s teasing now?” he asked, his eyes trained on hers, his voice still light and playful.  
Chloe swallowed hard, that vibrant blue was back. That intensity she read in his expression last night, even though he was dreaming. Or was he more aware of things while he slept walked that he first led her to believe? He held her for a beat longer than necessary for her to find her own footing and she felt the loss of his arms when he stepped away. He didn’t stop watching her though, and she was suddenly afraid of what she might have betrayed in her own expression.

“Well, I guess we better move,” she said breaking eye contact. “Crew starts early and if it’s eggs today, they’ll probably clean it all up before we can even get there.”  
She was at the hatch door before she thought she heard him say something under his breath. And she swore she must be daydreaming because he couldn’t have possibly said what she thought, she heard.

“Food won’t sate the kind of hunger I’ve got.”

 


End file.
